double cheeseburger Archives - Lazy Man and Money

I have to admit it… I eat at fast food restaurants. I’ve tried to avoid them in an attempt to be more healthy, but time and again I find myself gravitating towards food that is fast, cheap, and tastes good. (My taste buds are not the most refined.) As one might expect some of the better values at fast food places are on the value menu. That’s almost always where I get my food. For a dollar or two you can get a full meal. That’s not always true, sometimes you have to be a little careful, value menu items vary vastly. For instance McDonald’s Dollar Menu features a 390 calorie McDouble and a 160 calorie Fruit ‘n Yogurt Parfait. Your dollar goes more than twice as far (in terms of calories) by opting for the McDouble.

I thought about writing about maximizing the calories per dollar. However, I couldn’t, in good conscience, completely ignore the health aspect. Lazy Man and Health is already unhappy with me with it’s hiatus. So I make a point to offer a “more healthy” option… not necessarily actually healthy. Call it a bit of a compromise.

That said, here are six fast food restaurants and my selections for the best value menu options:

McDonald’s Dollar Menu

The Value: McDouble – This burger had 390 calories – enough to be a meal in itself for a lot of people. While it does have 19 grams of fat, it does have 22 grams of protein and 33 grams of carbs. That sounds pretty close to the Zone diet for me.
The Healthy Option: McDouble – I couldn’t find a good healthy option on McDonald’s value menu. It might be a surprise with the Fruit ‘n Yogurt Parfait sitting there, but I’m a protein-focused guy and the parfait is pretty much empty there. It also has nearly as many carbs as the McDouble. I’d nominate the McChicken as a runner up. It has more carbs and less protein and fat than the McDouble, but it seems like a decent option. Then again it made the top 5 worst foods according to The Cancer Project.
Watch Out For… the Double Cheeseburger – McDonald’s used to have the double cheeseburger on the dollar menu. Near me they moved that to their regular menu and raised the price to $1.29. In it’s place, they’ve added the aforementioned McDouble. It’s the same burger with one slice of cheese instead of the double cheeseburger’s two. So an extra slice of cheese raises the price by 29%… Hmmm, I think the McDouble works for me. And while I think McDonald’s is sneaky here, they talk about the McDouble vs. the double cheeseburger very openly.

Burger King’s Value Menu

The Value: Whopper Jr. – At 370 calories, it can substitute as a meal itself as well.
The Healthy Option: Whopper Jr. – The 21 grams of fat, 16 grams of protein, 40 grams of carbs doesn’t stand up to the McDouble. It’s really not that healthy of an option. You’ll note that I left off the side salad.
Watch Out For… The Side Salad – The side salad seems to have 40 calories… While it may have been a better option for the healthy choice, I’d need to eat 8 salads before I get close to approaching a meal. There’s not a lot of value in an $8 dollar fast food salad.

Random useless fact: Did you know that Burger King is called Hungry Jacks in Australia? I thought there was some massive trademark infridgement involved when I went “down under.”

Wendy’s Super Value Menu

The Value: Grilled Chicken Go Wrap – Though the Double Stack’s 360 calories is probably more for you money, I’m going with the 260 calorie Grilled Chicken Go Wrap. The reason is that it has 17 grams of protein to 11 grams of fat. If you opt for two of them, you have a 34 gram protein meal with 22 grams of fat. It’s just a better ratio than the Double Stack’s 23 protein to 18 fat ratio.
The Healthy Option: Grilled Chicken Go Wrap – All in all, it’s very close, but I’m going with the Grilled Chicken Go Wrap. It was healthy enough to get the value call above despite being a 100 fewer calories than the Double Stack.
Watch Out For… Mayonnaise and Honey Mustard Sauce – If you take the Honey Mustard Sauce out of the Grilled Chicken Go Wrap, you can get it to 220 calories, 17 grams of protein and 8 grams of fat. It will take you $2 to get up to a meal, but it will be amongst the healthier value meal options.

Taco Bell’s “Why Pay More?”

The Value: Cheesy Double Beef Burrito – Taco Bell has quite a few options that would qualify, but there’s no mistaking the value of the Cheesy Double Beef Burrito. It’s a whopping 460 calories for 89 cents (in most locations). While the protein and fat are both around 20 grams doesn’t make it the healthiest meal, it’s not horrible. At least that’s my opinion, but the The Cancer Project also had this on their unhealthy menu.
The Healthy Option: Taco Bell Fresco Menu – The whole Taco Bell Fresco Menu scored major points from me in the past by offering a whole menu of items. My pick is the Fresco Bean Burrito. It has a 330 calories, 11 grams of protein, with 9 grams of fat and fiber.
Watch Out For… Triple Layer Nachos – With 18 grams of fat and 7 grams of protein, it’s a tough pick. It does have some guacamole which will have good fat from avocados, but I still don’t think that saves it.

Kentucky Fried Chicken

The Value: Buffalo Original Recipe Snacker – My research seems to show that their value menu was announced in February earlier this year. The KFC Snacker Sandwiches seems to be a bit of a disappointing deal for $1. It maxes out at 320 calories (the fish version – are you really going to eat fish at KFC?) and averages around 265 calories. You may need to order two.
The Healthy Option: Buffalo Original Recipe Snacker – At 240 calories it’s a little light on value, but it does have 15 grams of protein and only 7 grams of fat. The sodium is the highest at 710mg, but let’s gloss over that.
Watch Out For… The Prices – With no value item over the 320 calories (that I could find), you might have to augment it with two items. From a calorie per dollar perspective, I think you can do better at other places.

Special Note: Today you can stop in and can grab a piece of free Kentucky Grill Chicken.

Jack in the Box

(Note: I only added this regional chain because there are a ton near me.)

I’m not a fan of Jack in the Box’s marketing campaign – they had their mascot hit by a bus during the Super Bowl. I wanted to boycott them for that kind of craziness, but there’s a very, very convenient Jack in the Box on my way to work. They also offer their whole menu at any time.

The Value: The Big Cheeseburger – I get it without the mayo sauce. Even without it, the Big Cheeseburger is 550 calories – more than enough for a meal for me. It’s not particularly healthy – the value here is a big meal for $1.29 (the price near me).
The Healthy Option: The Big Cheeseburger with no Bun or Sauce – I’m not happy with any of the Jack in the Box options… I found nothing that close to healthy on the value menu. They have options off the value menu, but that’s off topic. I’m not even happy with this call as it has 25 grams of fat and only 15 grams of protein. At least it comes in at 309 calories and only 5 carbs for those Atkins followers.
Watch Out For… Your Heart – The prices are decent, but the nutrition is a little lacking. While fast food is almost a “sometimes food”… it seems that it’s true for Jack in the Box even more than other fast food places.

Photo Credit: Blyzz

I thought about not posting the last two stories, but I figured they were entertaining and the kind of thing that I would to read if I were someone else. Not too much personal finance after the first story, so if that’s your interest, just jump straight down to the links and enjoy.

Story 1 – Small Business Stimulus Package
You have a small business and need a boost in this economy? This is your lucky day. Ben at Money Smart Life is giving away a Small Business Stimulus Package. You can win $250 in cash and/or various web consulting services.

Story 2 – The Drive-In
I need people’s thoughts on this one. Let me know if I’m a jerk here or not. I’m at the McDonalds Drive-Thru the other day (probably a once-a-month thing and I typically get a double cheeseburger and move on). This drive-thru is a little weird. It actually splits the line into two for ordering and then re-merges them. I guess it’s faster that way because they two people ordering at the same time and can process the food faster. Cool idea, I just don’t know how they manage to give people the right food with the merge. If one side takes 15 minutes and I’m ordering just a double cheeseburger, well you can see how one side could move much faster than the other at times.

I’m done ordering and looking to merge back into the single line. I let one car go from the other side (the car that was before me when I entered the split to order). However, another car is trailing it, probably 18 inches of space between them. I’m waiting for them to stop and let me in (typical zipper merge), but they just keep driving. Finally I honk my horn to let them know that I’m there and waiting and have as much right as they do (there is no yield) to get my food. Probably more because if they mess up the merge, who knows if they’ll get my order right? This is a drive-thru so you know it’s already a high risk even before you add this merge twist.

So I honk my horn and the other car stops. They roll down my window and they are a 70 year old couple (just a guess). I ask them if they were going to let me merge (in not the most polite tone). They called me a name back and finally told me to go ahead. So here’s the thing… am I the biggest jerk in the world for being angry at my elders? Do they get a free pass to be rude because they are older? In the end I decided that all things being equal, all people deserve to be treated equally. It doesn’t matter if you are old, young, blue, purple, or some third gender that scientists just discovered last week.

Story 3 – The Football Game
I went to the Oakland Raiders game with my wife yesterday. Longtime readers know that I’m a big Patriots fan, so I was putting myself in enemy territory in one of the dangerous stadiums in the US. There were signs and public announcements everywhere reminding fans of conduct rules. In fact they have a SMS number where you can just pre-type in your section and row, so if there’s a problem, you hit send and the police are there. I wish I were making that last sentence up.

If that last point wasn’t strong, my wife may have had the quote of the day, “I don’t have a lot of rules in life, but one of them is that if you have a jacket covered in skulls, you get to get on the escalator ahead of me. You know, generally speaking.”

Towards the end of the game, the 100 Oakland fans (starting down 21-0 before you get a first down and losing big in 3 hours of rain will eliminate most fans) gathered around the Patriots bench to taunt them with chants of 18-1 referring to the Patriots record last year. I really don’t understand this chant. Roughly translated I take it to mean, “You just had as many wins as any team in the National Football League in a season. Also you had a higher winning percentage than anyone has achieved in any of the four major sports in the US (outside of the other two teams that I think accomplished the same feat). On the other hand, my Oakland Raiders have managed to win 18 games in the 5 years – combined.” I wish I had video of it, so I could put it on Failblog.org.

A finally football thought: The Patriots could go 11-5 winning approximately 69% of the games they play this season and not make the playoffs. Another team, Denver Broncos or San Deigo Chargers, depending tie-brakers, could go 8-8, just 50% of their games, and make the playoffs. By the way winning 69% of your games would have made you the fourth best NBA team last year and the best baseball team by a mile. Sure a lot has to do with a small sample size of the NFL, but that’s amazing. If someone has some extra time on their hands, I would love to read the highest winning percentage a team has had and not made the playoffs in any sport. I don’t know how hockey does winning percentage with it’s ties (so I’ll leave that to a hockey fan).

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